nyslfriends Chapter 1155 - 1088: The Crown Furnace
Chapter 1155 - 1088: The Crown Furnace
On September 23, just on the night when Jeanne defeated Kennard, two thousand Defensive Army soldiers seized the south gate of Sk Wolf Castle.On September 24, due to the heavy rain and muddy roads at night, the Wonyu City army was delayed.
Due to the Wonyu City army's persistent delay, the Longbow Castle Defensive Army had no choice but to retreat.
But surprisingly, the central army of Puzilio, which was supposed to support Sk Wolf Castle on time, also arrived a day late due to the rain.
Seeing the battle report, Jeanne and Piasu were extremely annoyed, knowing they shouldn't have retreated.
Nevertheless, the general strategic objective has been accomplished.
Out of the six thousand Kingdom Army soldiers at the forefront, the most combat-experienced one thousand cavalry were defeated and captured, and of the remaining five thousand, nearly a third fled in panic and were lost.
This achievement alone was enough to make Puzilio hesitant and halt their advance.
Soon after, far away in the Holy Court Barracks, Horn received a diplomatic notice forwarded by the Falan.
"What does it say?" Horn tossed the diplomatic notice onto the long table of the Stag Chamber meeting, "How should we respond?"
Busak was still networking in North Norn, so the affairs were still handled by the Acting Deputy Secretary, Alfonso.
The contents of the notice were already reviewed by the senior officials beforehand.
It was nothing more than a furious denunciation of Horn's lack of honor, accusing him of secretly dispatching the Holy Alliance Army for support, with rather intense rhetoric.
The senior officials maintained stern faces, the muscles around their eyelids and cheekbones occasionally twitching, all staring with solemn expressions at Horn, who was striving hard.
The seniors said nothing.
Only Alfonso coughed, picking up the diplomatic notice: "... The envoy from Leia wrote in the letter that if we do not recall our troops, we will face their fierce retaliation, and also asked, 'You wouldn't want Cold Spring Castle to be attacked by the troops we secretly dispatched either, would you?'"
"Pfft—"
"Cough hah hah."
A burst of stifled laughter immediately echoed everywhere, and the Exorcist Leader Hakuto couldn't hide it any longer, his mouth stretching to his molars.
"All right, all right, no laughing, we're having a meeting." Horn, his mouth also grinning, forcibly knocked on the table.
Unlike the secular folks like Hakuto, Horn's smile was not mockery toward Leia Kingdom, but a smile of victory... truly!
This time's head-on blow to Puzilio successfully cast doubt on Puzilio's strategy to attack Wonyu City.
Otherwise, they wouldn't be breaking down so defensively.
"With this, the previously precarious Five Cities Alliance is off to a good start." Alfonso laughed as he spoke to Thomas beside him.
Regarding the matter of establishing a Holy Alliance abroad, it was entirely under the charge of Thomas, who was a black-robed senior official of the Holy Sect, Saint Father's Association, and the Saint's Great-Grandson.
However, the specific details of affairs were still left to be handled by Thomas' Secret Monk, Jonar.
Hakuto looked toward Horn: "Now that the situation has opened up and we can delay two or three more months, that adds nearly half a year.
Is there anything your Eminence thinks Her Highness Jeanne should do next?"
Recalling the map of Dawn Island in his mind, one can see that the Five Cities Alliance roughly distributes among three counties: Waterwheel County, Devlan County, and Wokin County.
Longbow Castle in Devlan County, Wonyu City and Malaby City in Waterwheel County, and Silver Castle in Wokin County.
Of course, there is also Silver Bud City in Immortal Stone Field, which is part of the upstream alliance of the four cities.
Between the four cities on Dawn Island, there are also numerous small towns and villages, as well as knight estates.
Initially, these small towns, villages, and noble knights were baffled and uncertain.
If the Five Cities Alliance displayed a trend of decline from the beginning, perhaps they might take refuge in Leia.
Nowadays, "Saint Joan" herself nearly conquered Sk Wolf Castle in one battle; though it wouldn't necessarily make other nobles surrender, it at least deterred them from acting rashly.
"Next, I think we should proceed in three steps." Horn pulled out three documents he had long prepared and tossed them onto the table one by one, opening his mouth with each toss.
"Invite, behead, make them dogs."
Inviting means allowing diplomatic envoys of Bradak and missionaries of the Holy Sect to diplomatically attract neutral towns and villages.
Beheading means the Longbow Castle Defensive Army accepting reports, specifically targeting notorious, unrighteous nobles, knights, or bishops to launch a judicial holy war.
Making them dogs means establishing a joint devoted committee under the joint defense committee.
The primary content of devotion is to do business with the Holy Alliance.
Have the devoted Holy Alliance lead the devoted Dawn Island, tightening the bonds of interest.
As for where the interests come from, the Holy Alliance has provided Dawn Island's Five Cities Alliance with a low-tariff policy and an ever-increasing production of various products.
Any member who joins the joint devoted committee can cast a vote and have a say in the allocation of tax exemption certificates.
The joint devoted committee can also connect local merchants and artisans with merchants and workshops on the Holy Alliance side to establish relations and collaborate.
Don't think the Holy Alliance has no consumer demand for Dawn Island—it does.
For instance, Dawn Island's wine is world-renowned, along with its various economic crops, including medicinal herbs, flax, vine oil, etc.
The Holy Alliance, being a semi-inland country (leased Pearl Harbor), cannot fully self-sustain its raw materials.
Taking Dawn Island wine as an example, different times and regions of harvest, combined with different brewing methods, result in hundreds of sub-categories under one major wine category.
Expensive ones can reach up to hundreds of gold pounds, while cheap ones only cost a few dinars.
This is only civilian consumption. Materials and metals needed for mechanical production at the Holy Court Barracks must be imported from all over.
For instance, the ether-driven iron furnace [Crown Furnace] decoded from the Celestial Maiden Secret Scroll, one essential material, brocade seed, is only produced on Dawn Island.
Thinking about the Crown Furnace, Horn temporarily set aside matters concerning Jeanne: "How is the construction of the Crown Furnace going?"
"All eight iron furnaces are operating well, and the plan is to increase to over thirty by the end of the year." Madlan handed a document to Horn, "Each furnace can produce 250 tons of pig iron over three months, 25 times that of a traditional medicinal furnace, 10 times that of a dwarf furnace."
The Crown Furnace is also considered a type of medicinal furnace, with a tubular long body and a tree crown-like top, hence the name.
The main materials for the Crown Furnace's medicine include two kinds: sulfa tablets and brocade seeds.
However, unlike traditional furnaces, it can be accelerated with the help of resonance by alchemists or dragon bone fragments.
The material costs are three times that of traditional medicinal furnaces, but the output is 25 times greater.
According to the most extreme situation submitted by the Holy Council, forced acceleration using ether resonance can push single furnace output to 1000 tons.
But that would require importing neutral gull refractory clays from Whitesand, or else the pig iron impurities would be very high.
"Well, with this, about four pig iron furnaces should perfectly supply one Lightning Furnace!"
A Lightning Furnace requires about three hundred tons of pig iron monthly, totaling nine hundred tons over three months.
3.6 ether iron furnaces' output perfectly supplying a Lightning Furnace's steel production.
"So, should we proceed like this?" Horn picked up Madlan's report, inquiring left and right.
At this moment, Qianqian spoke: "I think we should wait a bit, don't rush to expand production capacity too quickly."
"What production capacity are you referring to?"
"Of course, it's the iron material." Qianqian rolled her eyes, fiddling with the hair clip on her short hair, "You increased production capacity, but didn't consider how to transport the iron ore? Do we have enough ships?"
The lively discussion in the Stag Chamber suddenly quieted down.
Indeed, due to Crown Furnace requiring ether resonance acceleration, with normal alchemist mana driving, it would basically produce only three to five times the output.
That means a massive amount of iron ore, roughly triple the weight of pig iron, must be transported to the Holy Court Barracks.
With thirty furnaces' capacity, it would require nearly 8000 tons of iron ore monthly transported from North Mangde County.
The Ibe River is wide enough to accommodate that many ships.
The problem lies in transportation costs and the number of ships, though it's increased compared to before, still falling short of the 25-fold output.
Before the meeting, Qianqian of the Holy Court had already received the production expansion plan and immediately started calculating.
The calculation results were handed to Horn, who immediately let out a "Tsss—".
After a moment, he scratched his head: "Is there a faster method?"
"Unless you can invent the ether field relay tower this year, otherwise, no."
After a moment of silence, Horn could only close the two plans: "Go to the Falan Embassy and ask to place the next ship order, see if there's a discount, perhaps 15% off, or even 10% would be fine..."